I rose again at about 0530, having waited an hour or so for Debbie to wake up.Whenever we travel from East to West we always wake up early thanks to the time differences.We are heading for Roatan and we have never been there before.

Yesterday was a day at sea and we spent the day doing what most passengers do… eating. Last night was a formal night but we decided that after our long journey and being on tour we would stay in the cabin rather than ‘get posh’. Lots of passengers were telling us, some with great glee, about the terrible acts they had had on board and some were telling me about the crew member who did a magic act in the ship’s talent show. He was very good apparently and this is a repeat ‘view’ of something I noticed when I was 18 years old and on a troopship: If a magician is from a different culture British audiences think they are great, no matter how bad or how simple the presentation. In this case, however, when I asked what he did and they told me, I was pleased to hear that all his simple tricks (and they were) are on sale at www.magicandfancydress.com . I wonder if he is a customer?

Dawn was breaking at 0530 and I sat on the balcony with a cup of tea, watching the sea changing from inky black to deep blue as the sky went through all the shades of turquoise and pink getting lighter and lighter until it was bright blue. Light clouds went from pink to white and from nowhere a little bird was swooping just above the water. The islands off the Honduras kept looming up and vanishing astern as we cruised by and the TV tells me it’s going to be 20 degrees. That’ll do me fine.

Today in Roatan I must do a bit of shopping to get the ‘disposables’ that I use in my act because we have two shows to do tonight. Oh the strain the strain.

I am now in inventive mode as I sit on the balcony and thinking that they could have long tubes, half rounded or even square, on the sides of every deck running the full length of ships. In times of impending disaster the Captain would either press buttons (but there would also be manual over-ride levers) that would release full length large airbags made of that impregnable material they use on RNLI ribs. If the ship started to go over the airbags on that side would support the ship in the water and possibly even create an angle for the lifeboats on that side to get clear. Dream on Daniels.

3 comments to The Morning of the Third Day

You wouldn’t be the first magician to turn their mind to saving people on boats. Howard Thurstan developed a system where the deck would turn into life rafts. However like many of his inventions no-one is sure if it would ever work